Leonard was injured while Pachulia was guarding him but did not think the Warriors player hurt him intentionally, as the exec above indicated.

“Did he step under it? Like, on purpose? No,” Leonard said, according to a tweet from Mike Finger of the San Antonio Express-News. “He was contesting the shot. Shot clock was coming down. I’ll have to see the play.”

Pachulia was asked about whether it was intentional as well and he said “that’s really stupid” because he was just handling the shot.

The Warriors went on to overcome a deficit once as large as 25 points as Leonard missed the remainder of the game.

This is not the first time Pachulia has had questionable contact with Leonard while on defense. Check this video for history from when he was played for Dallas.

Folks on Twitter seemed to agree more with the NBA executive than with Leonard and thought the play was dirty.

Bryan Kalbrosky

Bryan is an NBA writer for HoopsHype and was the editor for USA TODAY SMG's Rams Wire blog. He has published with FOX Sports, Noisey, Bleacher Report, LA Weekly, Huffington Post and various other publications. bryan.kalbrosky@gmail.com.